(164494). Basho was one of the most important poets of Japan. He is considered a master of the haiku, an unrhymed poetic form consisting of 17 syllables arranged in three lines of 5, 7, and 5 syllables, respectively. Basho greatly enriched the form and made haiku an accepted medium of artistic expression.

Basho's original name was Matsuo Manefusa. He was born in 1644 in Ueno, Iga province, Japan.

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